I can't come up with any explanation for them, especially not anything that explains *both* of them. They're at very different water depths (~2000m west vs ~200m east) and it seems that the westward one is the primary target of AMOC flow.

It seems like to research further I would need data on the water density gradient around this region, but I'm not really sure where to look.

I can't come up with any explanation for them, especially not anything that explains *both* of them. They're at very different water depths (~2000m west vs ~200m east) and it seems that the westward one is the primary target of AMOC flow.

It seems like to research further I would need data on the water density gradient around this region, but I'm not really sure where to look.

You could start here https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms2505 here's an exagerated bathymetryMy own understanding is that they are caused by residual currents, which are driven by tidal flows, forced to the surface by local conditions, but I'm no expert.One of my own, does anyone know of site that does current and hindcast charts for arctic slp, covering the last 10 days or so. [added] This shows the tidal surge and the local amphidromic points and cotidal lines http://www.esr.org/AOTIM/M2.jpg

I don't profess to be an expert on deep ocean currents either but it is worth looking at the reference period the anomaly refers to.

It seems for a long time now that the SSTs near Svalbard have been showing up quite frequently as anomalously warm. Quite often, as the ice retreats, those sea areas that are no longer near an ice edge will show up as way above normal. This has been happening near Svalbard as ice has retreated substantially in the Greenland and Barents Seas and Atlantic water moves north.

Compared to the pre 1980s this area has changed considerably regarding ice cover. No longer do we see the Odden Ice tongue forming to the SW of Svalbard. If you consider the SST anomalies are often referred to the 1971-2000 period, it is not hugely surprising to see big rises now w.r.t that time period.

I often use the NOAA/ESRL website to look at the SSTs (I think it is visually easier to see the anomalies because it treats +/- 0.5 C as being "normal" and colours it white and the seasonal/yearly loops are good). https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/map/clim/sst.shtml

In this cropped image on daily SST anomaly, there is a similar area to the one in the nullschool image which shows SSTs as much as 3 C above normal south of Svalbard.

The reference period here is 1971-2000.

However when I looked at the weekly anomalies I notice they are way less in the same area. Barely 1C above normal. Reason : the reference period has changed. (I don't know why NOAA cannot keep the same ref period!). It is now referred to 1981-2010.

So it seems if you change the ref period and replace the 1970s with the 2000s, the SST anomaly near Svalbard decreases by about 2 C. The 1970s being that much colder than the 2000s.

Note also the big red anomaly in the north of the Caspian Sea in the first chart. I wonder does this again refer to an area that was once ice covered for a time in late winter/spring in the last 3 decades of the 20th century but now no longer affected by ice and hence the large anomaly?

Yes Johnm, when you drill down close to the centre of western Svalbard anomaly, it is currently as high as 11 C. I hadn't realised it was that high for April

This Artic News BlogSpot has some diagrams of the bathymetry around Svalbard and refers to similar anomalies back in June 2015.

"Cold meltwater with low salt content floats around Svalbard where the water is most shallow. A 'polar front' separates cold and warm water, following the borders of the area where the seafloor is high. Warm, salty water is carried by the Gulf Stream from the (much deeper) Atlantic Ocean into the Arctic Ocean. This warm water collides with cold water east of Svalbard where the seafloor rises steeply, making this warm water come to the surface.

Warm water from the Atlantic also comes to the surface west of Svalbard, where warm and cold water are similarly separated by the height of the seafloor."

Glacial ice from Mendenhall Glacier was a favorite in San Francisco, back before the quake, to cool gentlemen's whiskey, as it didn't melt as rapidly (and dilute the liquor). It was the purity of the ice that slowed the melt.

Possibly. Or they may just not have been the first or the last rich people to buy stupid things for stupid regions. Remember, this is a world in which people will buy bottled water from f*cking Fiji.

Locally an international bottled water concern is draining a huge swamp. They don't label it as "Pure Canadian Swamp Water", but they do sell a lot of it.Fools & MoneyTerry

Niall you could take a look at http://marine.copernicus.eu/services-portfolio/access-to-products/This illustrates product/dataset/variableclick the circle below linear and it should look likeThen your set to explore the temp. gradients just click on areas of interest, there's an optional lat/long grid. Way too cold for me, I used to think it had something to do with the arctic deep waters exiting, not any more. If you look at the tide gif just as the force of the tide is waning near Svbd. high water is called for in Nares, if thats happening twice a day[+/-] i suspect there's a residual current forcing it's way over the rise [yermak plateau], attenuated by other local and not so local events. The sss here also hints at that https://www7320.nrlssc.navy.mil /GLBhycomcice1-12/arctic.html

I can't come up with any explanation for them, especially not anything that explains *both* of them. They're at very different water depths (~2000m west vs ~200m east) and it seems that the westward one is the primary target of AMOC flow.

It seems like to research further I would need data on the water density gradient around this region, but I'm not really sure where to look.

see other replies there and my comment #2044 and have come to the conclusion that the ocean model used for the nullschool surface temperature isn't working well there. There is a fairly narrow trough in the ocean floor in that area with shallower water to the north. Possibly the ocean model does not resolve this well and exaggerates upwelling. I don't know how it treats the icecovered areas further north where no current is displayed. Could it be that model boundaries have an effect?As has been pointed out by Niall these SSTs are not seen by the Norwegian Weather service, which should have some local expertise https://www.yr.no/kart/#lat=77.65742&lon=18.92647&zoom=6&laga=havtemp&proj=3575I also looked at IR images on worldview, I would expect such high temps to show up against colder surrounding areas. Cloudless days are rare but see this from the 20thhttps://go.nasa.gov/2piYsoDI don't expect to be able to read exact temperatures from this brightness temperature but water further south shows up brighter and land/water ice/water contrast shows up well so why don't those warm water surface in nullschool show?

Lately I've been thinking that the best way to avoid cataclysmic global warming would be to cull a majority of the human population.

Now, the best way to do that would be a nuclear war.

Maybe Trump does care about Global Warming after all!

And that, is what we used to call, throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

Silly Lad! Common misconception that overpopulation is the problem.

When you take a honest rational look. The worlds richest 50 people own 50% of the resources and are responsible for over 90% of the environmental destruction. The poorest 50% of the worlds population have a net positive effect on the Biodiversity and total Biomass around them. As do any species acting as a responsible member of Gaia's community of species.

If you want to cull population. 50 individuals is plenty. The world actually needs a lot more POOR people if we gonna save it.

Hopefully Trumps wall will be built in time for it to trap the rich under a new ice sheet. We don't want them to get to mexico and ruin the interspecies ecological harmony there and further south.

Logged

Policy: The diversion of NZ aluminum production to build giant space-mirrors to melt the icecaps and destroy the foolish greed-worshiping cities of man. Thereby returning man to the sea, which he should never have left in the first place.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McGillicuddy_Serious_Party

When you take a honest rational look. The worlds richest 50 people own 50% of the resources and are responsible for over 90% of the environmental destruction. The poorest 50% of the worlds population have a net positive effect on the Biodiversity and total Biomass around them. As do any species acting as a responsible member of Gaia's community of species.

If you want to cull population. 50 individuals is plenty. The world actually needs a lot more POOR people if we gonna save it.

Hopefully Trumps wall will be built in time for it to trap the rich under a new ice sheet. We don't want them to get to mexico and ruin the interspecies ecological harmony there and further south.

With respect Hyperion, this comment is nonsense. Even readers of the Stupid Questions topic deserve better. Can you offer any rational support for the assertions above (bold added), all of which register as false.

Creativity and technology, driven by wealth, power, and possibly greed on one hand. 7 or 70 billion subsistence farmers on the other hand. Which one portends a better outcome?

Here's an interesting look at how the 'poor' people of Easter Island may have managed their ecology. No such alternate views afaik for how the Anasazi used up their critical Juniper supply, and other ecological disasters of pre-modern societies as detailed in the referenced Jared Diamond book.

When you take a honest rational look. The worlds richest 50 people own 50% of the resources and are responsible for over 90% of the environmental destruction. The poorest 50% of the worlds population have a net positive effect on the Biodiversity and total Biomass around them. As do any species acting as a responsible member of Gaia's community of species.

If you want to cull population. 50 individuals is plenty. The world actually needs a lot more POOR people if we gonna save it.

Hopefully Trumps wall will be built in time for it to trap the rich under a new ice sheet. We don't want them to get to mexico and ruin the interspecies ecological harmony there and further south.

With respect Hyperion, this comment is nonsense. Even readers of the Stupid Questions topic deserve better. Can you offer any rational support for the assertions above (bold added), all of which register as false.

Creativity and technology, driven by wealth, power, and possibly greed on one hand. 7 or 70 billion subsistence farmers on the other hand. Which one portends a better outcome?

Here's an interesting look at how the 'poor' people of Easter Island may have managed their ecology. No such alternate views afaik for how the Anasazi used up their critical Juniper supply, and other ecological disasters of pre-modern societies as detailed in the referenced Jared Diamond book.

What happened on easter island is well known. The Island was a lush subtropical food forest in the mid 1700s. Then the invading cultural group known as the "short ears", an invasion originating in mongolia, burnt it to the ground in the process of exterminating the " long ears" the megalithic culture. Tall red haired green eyed chaps. Same thing happened in New Zealand. If you want an example of large scale results from intelligent gardening by dense populations. Look at the Amazon. Lined by cities of fifty plus thousand people. Until the European explorers decimated the Americas with disease in the early 1500s. Consider also those highly intelligent oceanic farmers the whales. Their loss has reduced the life in Antarctic waters alone by 90%. And without their migratory fertiliser spreading, and the return of nutrients to the surface by toothed whales. Probably 90% of the life in the rest of the oceans too. "Subsistence farming" is a derogatory slur. The rise of monocultural factory farming has turned 90% of terrestrial life into co2. From 1000 tons per hectare to ten. Its ecocide. And boots on the ground are needed to fix it.

Logged

Policy: The diversion of NZ aluminum production to build giant space-mirrors to melt the icecaps and destroy the foolish greed-worshiping cities of man. Thereby returning man to the sea, which he should never have left in the first place.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McGillicuddy_Serious_Party

Well spotted, thanks. The last few graphics at that site are pretty much what I was looking for.

Looks like the vast majority of advective energy comes from warm air.

Appears so and after this winter, well, it seemed overwhelming.However note that their estimate dont add up, and they recognize this lack of closure in the problemBig suspect is as always oceanic stuff (the hidden Lake Ness monster). I guess much more difficult to measure or estimate...Really interesting stuff...

I was just looking at the ice of Hudson bay and I noticed the southern part is at the same as the Netherlands, but temperatures in the Netherlands are currently 20-25 C, and that happens regularly in may the last couple of years.

And normally ice melts at those temperatures, and I guess Hudson bay has some salinity it melting point will be below 0 C.

Is the difference in temperature purely because of the Gulf Stream/ North atlantic drift? Or has the ice/snow some sort of self-supporting influence? Because then GW can drastically influence that area, can't it?

I was just looking at the ice of Hudson bay and I noticed the southern part is at the same as the Netherlands, but temperatures in the Netherlands are currently 20-25 C, and that happens regularly in may the last couple of years.

And normally ice melts at those temperatures, and I guess Hudson bay has some salinity it melting point will be below 0 C.

Is the difference in temperature purely because of the Gulf Stream/ North atlantic drift? Or has the ice/snow some sort of self-supporting influence? Because then GW can drastically influence that area, can't it?

I was taught that NW Europe is blessed with a milder climate because we are on the Western edge of a continent with a nice big ocean sending mild westerly winds towards us and that the north atlantic drift also sends vast quantities of additional heat to our shores. I also read an article from somwhere a good few years ago saying that on average Hudson Bay is ice-free for one extra day each year (from the satellite record).

Logged

"Para a Causa do Povo a Luta Continua!""And that's all I'm going to say about that". Forrest Gump"Damn, I wanted to see what happened next" (Epitaph)

I was just looking at the ice of Hudson bay and I noticed the southern part is at the same as the Netherlands, but temperatures in the Netherlands are currently 20-25 C, and that happens regularly in may the last couple of years.

And normally ice melts at those temperatures, and I guess Hudson bay has some salinity it melting point will be below 0 C.

Is the difference in temperature purely because of the Gulf Stream/ North atlantic drift? Or has the ice/snow some sort of self-supporting influence? Because then GW can drastically influence that area, can't it?

I'll just add that with expected release of fresher arctic waters into Baffin/Labrador and melt water from Greenland ending up in Labrador, the cold Atlantic anomoly to the south of Greenland will likely expand to the south and east so the differential will shrink.

magnamentis

since the oceans are warming in general, that cold spot, i relation to the surrounding seas, will ultimately still be warmer or the same like before. hope it's clear what i'm heading at.

a 2C colder spot in 10C water is 8C while while once it was 6 or 8 C for example. further i do not believe in those scencarios at all. even if the gulf stream will start dropping to the sea-floor 1000km earlier, it will still do it's job for most of western europe, perhaps, due to the generally warmer waters flowing up from the carribian even more so.

however, this is all prone to a huge amount of speculation due to its complexity, it's weven possible that the very very cold (1-2C waters flowing down from greenland will once simply free fall to the see floor, at least if the difference in temperature is great enough to compensate for the difference in salinity, or, it will first start to reduce salinity and drop to the sea-floor once salinity reaches a level where the difference in temperature has the great impact. last but not least we could face a different behaviour in winter and in summer, simply too many unknowns to make a bold statement like "IT WILL" IMO

i think that at best one could say that "IT COULD" while i clearly don't think so as far as european average temps are concerned, after all the globe is heating up and even hudson bay could see up to 5C higher average temps if things go the suspected way and it's INLAND. everyone knows that inland it's colder in winter and hotter in summer, best example since we follow up those things is SIBIRIA. 45C in summer and -50 in winter so to say.

since the oceans are warming in general, that cold spot, i relation to the surrounding seas, will ultimately still be warmer or the same like before. hope it's clear what i'm heading at.

a 2C colder spot in 10C water is 8C while while once it was 6 or 8 C for example. further i do not believe in those scencarios at all. even if the gulf stream will start dropping to the sea-floor 1000km earlier, it will still do it's job for most of western europe, perhaps, due to the generally warmer waters flowing up from the carribian even more so.

however, this is all prone to a huge amount of speculation due to its complexity, it's weven possible that the very very cold (1-2C waters flowing down from greenland will once simply free fall to the see floor, at least if the difference in temperature is great enough to compensate for the difference in salinity, or, it will first start to reduce salinity and drop to the sea-floor once salinity reaches a level where the difference in temperature has the great impact. last but not least we could face a different behaviour in winter and in summer, simply too many unknowns to make a bold statement like "IT WILL" IMO

We can speculate, or we can note that the Western Boundary Current (Gulf Stream) has trended poleward and sped up over the last couple of decades.

Whatever theory the idea of the currents slowing down and stopping is based upon, exactly the opposite has happened so far.

I was just looking at the ice of Hudson bay and I noticed the southern part is at the same as the Netherlands, but temperatures in the Netherlands are currently 20-25 C, and that happens regularly in may the last couple of years.

And normally ice melts at those temperatures, and I guess Hudson bay has some salinity it melting point will be below 0 C.

Is the difference in temperature purely because of the Gulf Stream/ North atlantic drift? Or has the ice/snow some sort of self-supporting influence? Because then GW can drastically influence that area, can't it?

I'll just add that with expected release of fresher arctic waters into Baffin/Labrador and melt water from Greenland ending up in Labrador, the cold Atlantic anomoly to the south of Greenland will likely expand to the south and east so the differential will shrink.

Hullo Rikw,

I have just been reading wikipedia on Hudson Bay. Fascinating, many unique characteristics making it very different. WORTH A READ. Link below

Rikw, a lot of it is the positive feedback between the NAD and sea ice. The drift both brings heat and prevents ice from forming. The north Atlantic/Barents is the only ice free area at high arctic latitudes. So when spring comes, all insolation is absorbed and temps can go up.In Hudson Bay, ice forms and stays for 6 months, reflecting the sun and absorbing any local heat into ice melting.Add to that the isolation of the bay which reduces waves, amd the lower salinity which promotes freezing, and probably some more items.

In the main thread a lot of people are getting excited about Nares "Export". But Baffin Bay is entirely frozen over. So why is it significant that ice is getting exported into more ice... more than any other Polynya opening up?

Because it's thick ice that will melt out in Baffin Bay, whereas it probably won't if it stays in the Central Arctic Basin. So, the earlier Nares Strait opens up, the more MYI will be transported to lower latitudes.

In the main thread a lot of people are getting excited about Nares "Export". But Baffin Bay is entirely frozen over. So why is it significant that ice is getting exported into more ice... more than any other Polynya opening up?

Ice in Baffin Bay reaches near-zero extent in August, more or less regardless of its initial condition. However, ice in the CAB, especially in the Lincoln Sea, can easily survive the summer, especially if it is thick.So when Nares exports thick ice from the Lincoln Sea to Baffin, the CAB loses a potential summer-surviving asset, while Baffin gains basically nothing.By the way, Baffin is not entirely frozen over at this time. It is currently about 200k km2 below its peak winter extent of 1.2 million km2.

In the main thread a lot of people are getting excited about Nares "Export". But Baffin Bay is entirely frozen over. So why is it significant that ice is getting exported into more ice... more than any other Polynya opening up?

All the ice in the Bay started breaking up and moving south in late March. It has been booking it out of there during April and May. Like the others said, it's doomed ice. Plus it leaves the door open for more to escape.

That suggests that the ice formation in the strait is restricted by warm upwelling waters at the Robeson channel that flow south (the current always flows south because the water in the Arctic basin is a few cms higher than that in Baffin bay). If the circulating Atlantic Waters (deeper than 200m) in the Nansen basin are becoming warmer, would that help to keep the Nares Strait open?

That suggests that the ice formation in the strait is restricted by warm upwelling waters at the Robeson channel that flow south (the current always flows south because the water in the Arctic basin is a few cms higher than that in Baffin bay). If the circulating Atlantic Waters (deeper than 200m) in the Nansen basin are becoming warmer, would that help to keep the Nares Strait open?

Does that qualify as a stupid question?

They may have believed the bolded in 1991. Nares Strait flows both north and south and both currents generally stay to their respective right, as would be expected in the Arctic. The southern current is the larger larger one.Check https://icyseas.org/Terry

This may well be totally OT, but it definitely qualifies as a stupid question.

There is a name for a river valley carved during the breakup of an ice sheet. The sudden ice/water outflow causes a deeper, wider, U-shaped trough to be carved and there is a name for this type of valley. I live adjacent to one of these features and at one time the name of the feature rolled off my tongue as easily as the name of the river. Today alas, it's gone & it aggravates me no end. It's like running into someone at a party whose face you remember, but you're unable to recall the name.

I've stumbled through Google and some aged geology texts with no luck at all. Any help would be very much appreciated.

Coulee is used AFAIK to describe what we'd call canyons or arroyos in the South West. The term I'm searching for is more generic, much less familiar, and I believe applies anywhere that ice sheets once covered or abutted. I believe I first stumbled upon it in a geology text covering Ontario Canada, but then saw it in other publications.

Coulee is used AFAIK to describe what we'd call canyons or arroyos in the South West. The term I'm searching for is more generic, much less familiar, and I believe applies anywhere that ice sheets once covered or abutted. I believe I first stumbled upon it in a geology text covering Ontario Canada, but then saw it in other publications.

Appreciate the helpTerry

Perhaps "tunnel valley"?Wikipedia:"A tunnel valley is a large, long, U-shaped valley originally cut under the glacial ice near the margin of continental ice sheets such as that now covering Antarctica and formerly covering portions of all continents during past glacial ages" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunnel_valley

Do you mean Jökulhlaup? It is not really the valley, rather the cause. The result can be termed a Jökulhlaup outwash. The valleys in northern Washington caused by repeated Jökulhlaups are called channelled scablands, which certainly does not roll off the tongue...

I seem to remember that type of valley being called a "hanging valley", although that probably only applies to U-shaped valleys that end high up a mountain side (i.e. the floor of the valley is higher than the floor of the valley they open into).

Another term is "trough valley", or "glacial trough valley".

As I understand it, during the ice ages U-shaped valleys are created by erosion from the constant movement of a glacier tongue flowing down from the main ice sheet. Once the ice melts, the valleys are exposed. These valleys tend to be very long and smooth. If the glacier tongue ends in water, the resulting valley will be shallower at the end, something that is often seen in glacier-carved fjords.

Hanging valleys in this context are formed when a tributary ice stream meets a much larger and deeper ice stream.

Alpine type glaciers do not flow from ice sheets, but start in a "corrie". Ice accumulates in the corrie and flows down the valley, but apparently there is a also a circular movement of the ice in the corrie itself which then creates the typical corrie depression. When the ice melts, a corrie lake or tarn fills the depression.

The circular movement of ice in the corrie causes erosion downward, and the out-flowing ice erodes a (usually) quite steep valley. As the corrie digs itself deeper, the mountain behind also starts eroding down into the corrie, causing it to move deeper into the mountain, resulting in very steep and eroded mountain sides rising directly up above the corrie.

Logged

because a thing is eloquently expressed it should not be taken to be as necessarily trueSt. Augustine, Confessions V, 6

Perhaps if I describe my local river valley, which had been described using the word(s)I'm seeking.Is cuts along a long north south rise that was clear of ice earlier than the lower lying areas - The valley cut along this rise, at times being constrained by the towering ice still extant on both sides. The valley is very shallow in comparison to it's depth and the present river meanders through this wide valley.There is a fair size moraine up stream from me where the valley had changed course from NW to NS, prior to the last glaciation the river valley had curved west at that point, but when the new valley was formed it straitened the old course and followed a Southerly course until it was swallowed by the then huge body of water that the Great Lakes now form the remainder of.This might have formed a hanging valley if another valley had been it's destination, but because it terminated in a lake it ended up broadening even further and lost itself in the various beach lines above Lake Erie.The portion on the valley that retains this unusual structure is not very long, I'd guess less than 40 miles.I really appreciate everyone's efforts. As I recall it was a combination of English words, similar to Hanging Valley, or trough Valley, as opposed to Jokulhualp, which my keyboard revolts at attempting.Please don't expend too much energy on this, Someone will either recognize what I'm trying to retrieve, or not. If not I've gotten along for a year or so with it being erased from my memory bank, and will survive it's passing.